4 x 4 correctly explains why the Huntsman is beloved by many and why some return year after year.

The reason that some go once and never again is two-fold:
1. The seeding and bracket play are incredibly drawn out. Often you will play just one game a day, thus meaning a longer more expensive stay in hotels and dining out.

2. The seeding is unpredictable. Rosters are expanded, often with ringers and players that have never played for the team before the tournament. Sandbagging is notorious in the seeding rounds (such sights as a team all batting opposite-handed or each player at an unfamiliar position on defense).

The result is that you may play a team you think you know and find a crusher instead (a problem except for the Major Plus guys); or you may defeat a team in the seeding round, only to be beaten in the bracket play by double digits; or you may experience playing a team that recently won in AAA or Major in Las Vegas in the Worlds, and now they are in with the AA teams.

In other words, go for the experience, not with expectations of winning a medal. That's why I am returning (and I have never gone other than 5 and done in the past because we don't sandbag or load up, but play our normal tournament team). I usually plan on taking a side trip on the last day I am there since my team is no longer in the running for a medal.

LeeLee, I covered this about 4 years ago in a series of posts and it's too much to recapitulate now, but here are some observations:

1. Las Vegas is not the true measurement of involvement in senior softball tournament play. Because of its status as America's "party city", and the attraction of gambling, etc., Las Vegas will always be a draw, whether with composite or aluminum bats. The real measure is the total number of teams entering all tournaments during the year in all associations that allow senior bats. It won't be as dramatic an increase, and may be a decrease.

2 The second factor is to measure how many men, former softball players who loved the sport, are now entering their tournament eligible years, say over the last 10 years. You will find that softball tournament participation percentage will lag behind the increase in senior male population.

3. Now factor in the increasing fitness of senior males due to better nutrition, better medicine, better surgery (know anyone playing with an artificial hip or knee? Of course you do), better fitness, etc. and you will find that the population that is already in their 60s and 70s should show little decline in participation due to health, yet there is a significant decline. For example, the Northern California Senior Softball Association now has 104 teams, and since players this year can double roster, the actual count is likely 98 or so equivalent teams. They had more than 100 ten years ago and the senior male population has increased by hundreds of thousands in California in that time.

Considering men in this demographic were part of the peak popularity period of softball in the 70s and 80s when softball was the most popular participation sport in America, why are they no longer playing? It isn't for lack of money (softball is still a bargain compared to golf, for example). It isn't because of bad health. It isn't because of busy lives (always present). It isn't because of lack of leisure time. I suggest that it is because the sport changed on them with the focus on power hitting (where even a pipsqueak like me can hit a home run when I couldn't hit even one my first 45 years with shorter fences) and the lesser importance on defense, base running, and strategy. The composite bats have cheapened slugging and batting average, just as the goosed up lanes and balls ruined bowling for many.

Go back to aluminum bats? In a heartbeat! Would restore the balanced game that was popular for decades and possibly tempt back the hundreds of thousands of aging male softball players who have rejected "home run derby" introduced with the composite bats.

Go back to Blue Dot balls? Not going to happen. As DCPete points out, they are dangerous for a lot of reasons. Our rec department banned them back in the day when we were swinging woodies and aluminum because of the injuries (to pitchers AND to third basemen and shortstops!). Just too hot for the human eye and brain to track.

Steven is correct that the balls were not at their usual performance level in Sacramento this year. I played in the tournament; temps were in the 90s; and the air was more humid than usual because of unseasonable rain on Tuesday and Wednesday of that week. But in the bigger picture, what does "not at usual level" mean?

I played thousands of games for decades when batted balls were not going as far as they were in Sacramento. Our outfielders were playing about 10-15 feet closer than normal because of the conditions, but they were still at distances that would have been on the other side of the fence in the 60s! When did expectations change that a big boy should hit a ball 400 feet…or that a normal 4-hitter should consistently keep outfielders hugging the warning track…or that 300 feet was an "old, smaller park"? The game has really changed, no doubt, and in doing so many have dropped softball as a sport. Whether the belief is that the game is now too fast; too offensively oriented; too tiring for outfielders; too frustrating for infielders; or too dangerous, men are choosing to leave the sport in droves as they age compared to previous years before the composite bats.

None of this excuses cheating. To cool down a ball for extra distance (compare 8:00am games with 4:00pm for the difference) is intentionally cheating. There would be no other reason, especially as this story hints that the drinking water was contaminated to achieve the cooling. As Swing and Tomar note, it is possible that some team members didn't know what was going on, but they are tarred with a charge of "cheater". Sad.

Big Mike, getting money back from one's bank is not likely in a situation like this.

One can put a stop payment on a check BEFORE it is cashed and incur no problems with your bank (but may be sued in a civil action by the payee who received, therefore, a "bad" check).

One can file a forgery affidavit attesting to the fact that someone else illegally used your name to write the check, but that is not true in this case since Harri wrote the check. A false forgery affidavit to get one's money back can result in a criminal action against the one attesting the charge.

One can file an affidavit swearing that the amount was altered; that someone other than the rightful payee cashed the check; etc., in other words attesting a criminal action by the recipient, but this also can result in criminal action against the filer of a false affidavit.

In Harri's case, he wrote a legitimate check to a legitimate payee who cashed the check. Maybe a partial refund could have been made by the TD, but in any case the bank is out of it—nothing to do with them. It is a private discussion and decision between two parties and one of them (maybe both!) just happens to be a bank customer.

and thanks, Dave, for the enlightening information about costs to a TD that may be overlooked. In my team's next tournament, we have a late start time on the first day, so all of us are driving to the tournament in the morning. If the schedule were to be redone at this late date so we had an early morning time, we would be unable to obtain lodging at the smaller community hosting the tournament because of limited hotel space, so it would be either leave at 4:00 am, or stay 30 miles away from the tournament site—neither a desirable option.

HJ, for tournament play, I get the elimination of the courtesy runner from home. But for a league like ours, where players have been buddies and participants for more than 3 decades in senior softball, there is always a compassionate allowance for the now permanently disabled player who can still swing a bat. 90% of the time the player does play catcher, since it is the least mobile position in mixed league play. But there are legitimate cases of a player requesting a runner from home and still able to field at first base…or third base…or right field…or as a rover (we let everyone play who is present, so we frequently have some rovers). We even had a temporarily disabled shortstop whose team valued his arm so much they took the chance that he could hobble to field a ball and still function a bit at short. Hard to make firm and fast rules for courtesy runners in league play.

Our league also allows a runner from home for a temporarily (e.g. hamstring problem) or permanently (e.g. artificial hip) disabled batter. As with other leagues above, the runner must begin behind the batter (in our case, quite a few feet behind). But we have no 20 foot rule or anything like it. The only time a batter tries to run is when it is a temporary situation, and in a senior moment, the runner takes off for a few steps on instinct. It doesn't interfere with the play at first. The courtesy runner is well wide of the batter. Usually the batter doesn't run more that a few steps (especially when the courtesy runner rushes by him on his right). And it sometimes results in a good-natured laugh at the batter's embarrassment. What does a 20 foot line accomplish?

Wildtimes, loved your comment that batting practice is not to gain further bad habits. Know a lot of guys that become fair bad ball hitters because they swing at everything thrown them and other guys who reinforce bad habits because they are determined to hit the entire bucket in their turn, even if their shoulders or arms are drooping from fatigue.

Great topic. I agree that discipline is a large part of it. Because I was hitting in the high 600s, my manager moved me to leadoff. Since then, with more responsibility to start the game off right, I am more selective and now hitting around .800 since batting leadoff. However, my slugging percentage is down a bit since I tend to hit more singles than trying to hit a long ball through the gaps.

One of the sweet things about senior ball is that since we are all on the decline in strength, stamina, etc., we can become better than our peers just by staying in shape or having good genetics or losing weight, etc. For example, I was never the fastest player on my teams in the past. I was usually in the top half since I gave running my all and I was slender, but there were always guys with more natural speed than me.

Now, those greyhounds are having knee or hip problems, or have gained significant weight over the years, or have a heart condition, or are paying the lung capacity price for decades of smoking, etc. and I am becoming the faster runner just by staying much the same but not diminishing as fast.

A couple of games come to mind (good topic, by the way, Southpaw)
I'm playing in a company picnic softball game in July, 1974. I'm one of the more experienced players on two coed teams, so I'm riding the ump a little bit from the bench on his calls. Naturally, I'm only challenging those that would benefit my team if reversed. But what's the ump going to do? Throw me out of a picnic game?

My team loses by fairly close score. Game over. On with the hamburgers. Game forgotten (by me). But some of the guys on my team are upset after the game. They get in the umpire's grill. Looks like it may even become physical. They are are accusing him of bias. I had no idea anyone would take this game seriously! Now I have to intervene and smooth things out. Who knew.

Second game of note.

I am in a tournament in Palm Desert. Some of the fields have no fences around the outfield. I'm playing left and hear a rustle in the bushes and cactus at the edge of the field. I go to investigate, thinking it might be a snake. Instead I find a roadrunner, an honest-to-goodness roadrunner. I walk toward it. He moves. Then I remember all those cartoons and I start running through the brush after him to see how fast he can move. I hear my manager calling. The game is starting and where is the left fielder? Red-faced I leave the bird and run to my position in the outfield.

rightrj1, only if we can reach the cut off man to relay and try to put out the turtle! I also warmed up with that weird heavy ball once and it made my arm sore also. Never again. Yet there are guys who swear by it. Takes all kinds, I guess.

rightrj1, a great question. I hope there is discussion. I never had a great arm. I never even had a decent arm! Second base or pitcher for me. I have noticed, by playing the outfield a lot more the past year, that long tossing has strengthened my arm but probably by only 15 or 20 feet. I still have a less than average arm (although it is a very accurate arm).

I can't remember a single player in my decades of softball who progressed from an average arm to a decent or good arm, never mind a strong arm. I think you are right that throwing-arm power is God-given and there is a limit to how much you can develop it.

On the other hand, I have seen players who had a strong arm lose that strength as time went by, usually by lack of use (not warming up, not coming to practice, etc.) to the point where as an older player they have a very average arm.

SSUSA, thanks for getting the scores and results up so promptly! It can be done!. I read the scores of all the divisions and there were a few typos where the "losing" team according to the scores posted was the one that advanced!:=)

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